Teishebaini

Teishebaini was the seat of Urartu's Transcaucasian provinces. King Rusa II founded it on the left bank of the Hrazdan river in the first half of the 7th century BC. Its name honors Teisheba, the Urartian god of war and storm.

The site was a working fortress and government center. City, palace, and citadel together covered more than 0.45 km2, closed in by towered and buttressed walls and pierced by massive gates. Inside, a parade ground opened onto storage rooms that took up the entire ground floor of the buildings.

Today the mound is known as Karmir Blur, "Red Hill." The color comes from fire. When the city burned, its mudbrick upper walls collapsed and crumbled, staining the hill red.

Teishebaini sits on the Karmir Blur hill on the left bank of the Hrazdan river, in Yerevan, roughly 6 km west-southwest of the city center in a straight line.